I have attached our Sugar High Galore description as well as the registration form for Bellingham Technical College’s Summer Educator Institute class. We need 12 to register by Friday, May 19 in order for it to run. If you are considering taking this class, please get your registration in as soon as possible. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to give me a call or email.

What does family dinner look like nowadays? In the digital age, it’s easy to let devices occupy more and more of our family time. As more kids and parents bring their devices to the dinner table, the opportunity to connect with family members without distractions is getting lost. One solution families can adopt is having a “device free dinner” with more bites and less bytes!

Join Common Sense to learn about their Device Free Dinner initiative. You’ll first hear from Michael Robb on the latest research on media, kids and families. For instance, how do parents feel about the impact of devices on their families? Do they feel that they—or their kids—are addicted to technology? What’s the importance of dinner time for family communication?

You’ll then hear from Kelly Mendoza about a free Device Free Dinner Toolkit with turnkey resources schools can use to designate a device-free dinner day. The toolkit includes materials for parents, classroom activities, a poster, and a community-building dinner event for schools. The various options in the toolkit will help schools customize a meaningful event for their communities. Help families support a balance between tech time and face-to-face time with Device Free Dinners!

Michael and Kelly will field your questions after their presentation. This edWebinar will benefit all school personnel, including teachers, administrators, principals, librarians, and tech coordinators, parent coordinators, and PTO staff. Read more.

Share, learn, and discuss ideas and best practices to enhance teaching with technology. Join the community for invitations to free edWebinars with CE certificates, access to a resource library and online discussion forums. Learn more.

edWeb.net is a free professional learning and social network that makes it easy for teachers and all educators to connect and collaborate with peers, share information and best practices, and spread innovative ideas to improve teaching and learning.

Make a difference in the lives of Washington students.
Be part of state’s leading coalition for financial literacy

Jump$tart Washington (JSW) is a nonprofit coalition created to promote the need for financial education in Washington State. We provide teacher training seminars, special events for students and reach citizens throughout the state. Our members include individuals, public and private organizations, educators, and non-profit associations – each passionate about making change and advancing our goal to:

Raise awareness for the need and importance of personal financial literacy

Increase the use of financial education programs in school and homes

Grow support for the coalition

Thousands of free financial education classes and seminars for consumers will be held throughout the U.S. during Money Smart Week, April 22-29.

Classes are open to people of all ages at businesses, financial institutions, schools, libraries, community organizations and government agencies throughout the country. They cover a wide variety of money-management topics including saving for college, buying a house, using credit wisely, managing student debt and financing retirement.

The educational events will be carried out by local and regional partnering organizations. In addition, there are several national partners, including the American Library Association, the Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and the United States Department of Agriculture Cooperative Extension. Money Smart Week is the broadest and most comprehensive financial education program in the country. Started in 2002 in Chicago with just 40 programs, it has expanded significantly to become the only national educational program for people at all stages of life.

Those who are interested in finding out about classes in their area during Money Smart Week can visit www.moneysmartweek.org.

Annual Program Grants – Deadline is June 30
JSW Program Grants fund projects that support development of personal finance skills of Washington residents, with emphasis on education for K-college youth. The current focus of grant awards is financial literacy that impacts high-needs populations and creates a best practice or tool that is replicable or scalable. Application deadline is Jun 30, 2017.

We will explore the new Virtual Economics flash drive with a focus on personal finance. This resource contains a treasure trove of classroom tested, teacher approved materials in a host of subjects! We would like to strongly encourage teacher and librarian pairs to attend.

What’s on the VE Flash Drive? 1400 active participation lessons, all correlated to the Common Core Standards. This amazing resource includes over 60 Council for Economic Education publications including (but not limited to):
• Personal Finance: Financial Fitness for Life (2nd edition), Learning, Earning and Investing: Elementary, Middle and High School
• Social Studies: Capstone–Teacher and Student Guides, Economics in Action, Focus Economics: k-2, 3-5, Focus: High School Economics, Focus: Middle School Economics, Focus: Understanding Economics in Civics and Government, Focus: Understanding Economics in U.S. History
• Mathematics: Mathematics & Economics: Connections for Life – 3-5, 6-8, 9-12
(See http://ve.councilforeconed.org/features/lessons.php for a complete
listing of the publications contained in this tool.)

Our educational program brings you information and training you need to stay ahead in our fast-paced, competitive industry. Hospitality experts and leading restaurant consultants take on the big topics and introduce you to practical tools and effective strategies for building winning teams, increasing sales and improving your bottom line. Click here for our full schedule.

The show offers a unique opportunity for you to taste products of some of the finest craft brewers, distillers and vintners from around the Northwest and beyond. Vendors will be sampling their very best tastes, so you can be sure to find a new favorite brand. Click here for a list of vendors.

You can attend the show for free if you register by the Saturday, April 22nd.

Every year thousands of restaurant and foodservice industry professionals attend the Northwest Foodservice Show to connect with hundreds of vendors on the show floor, expand their knowledge at the educational seminars, sample delicious new products and find inspiring ideas that will make the difference in their operations.

Whether it is operations, food cost, labor cost, available labor force, the diversifying of food or the importance of brand and marketing – just about every aspect of our industry is changing. Come talk to more than 400 exhibitors at the Northwest Foodservice Show and learn how they can help lower your costs, improve your margins and make your life easier.

You can attend this show for free. Just be sure to register here by Saturday, April 22nd, 2017. Registration is still available at the show, but it will be $25 per person.

Come talk to more than 400 exhibitors at the Northwest Foodservice Show and learn how they can help lower your costs, improve your margins and make your life easier. View the Floor Plan & Directory to see which companies are exhibiting.

The WA-FACSE board has decided not to provide professional development workshops at Summer Conference in August 2017. The decision to discontinue a financial rebate provided to sections in previous years was made without input from the entire WA-ACTE board (including other sections). The rebate, which was issued based on those who attended summer conference under the FACSE section, did not cover all of our expenses for Summer Conference, however, it did help offset costs and expenses incurred to put on quality and worthwhile sessions while at summer conference. We asked the WA-ACTE Board to reconsider this decision and they adamantly refused.

Your WA-FACSE board discussed in-length the options to best utilize our resources. The board voted that the time and work spent on the planning of summer conference speakers and sessions, on top of the expense to our association with no income, would be better spent working on and planning a successful FCS Annual Fall Conference.

Please know that this decision is not one that was taken lightly or made easily. It was voted on by the board at our spring meeting in Leavenworth. This does not mean we will sever ties with WA-ACTE nor does it mean we will not have FACSE workshops at future summer conferences. We want to take time to decide how best to serve you and stay on budget.

We are sending this early to allow you to plan accordingly. WA-ACTE Summer Conference is in Spokane, clock hours are provided, and professional development by other sections, OSPI and WA-ACTE will be provided. FACSE specific professional development will not occur until FCS Annual Fall Conference October 15th-17th, 2017 at the Red Lion in Spokane. More information to follow.

If you have any questions or concerns about this decision, please direct them to Kathi Hendrix, WA-FACSE Executive Director, at hendrixhm1@gmail.com